Roman chamomile
The other chamomile, and a genuinely different plant rather than a grade or a cultivar of the first. German chamomile is an annual of the genus Matricaria; this is a low creeping perennial of the genus Chamaemelum, with a stronger scent, a firmer flower and a markedly more bitter cup.
Identity
- Botanical name
- Chamaemelum nobile
- Family
- Asteraceae
- Part used
- Flower
- Origin
- Western Europe and north-western Africa — Atlantic France, Iberia, Britain and Ireland; naturalised widely beyond that
- Drunk in
- France, Belgium, England, Italy
Character
Sharper and much more bitter than German chamomile, with the same apple aroma sitting over a green, faintly camphorous base. A steep long enough to suit the German kind makes this one hard work.
Notes: apple, hay, green herb, camphor
History
Linnaeus described it as Anthemis nobilis and it was moved to Chamaemelum later, which is why old herbals, older packets and a good deal of the perfumery trade still carry the earlier name. In England it was grown as a lawn and path plant from the sixteenth century, planted to be walked on because bruising the foliage releases the scent — a use that has nothing to do with drinking it and everything to do with why it was in gardens at all.
How it is drunk
In France camomille romaine is sold beside camomille allemande and ordered by name, and the two are not treated as the same order. It is a household infusion in northern France, Belgium and England, and the flower turns up in Italian and Balkan domestic drinking. Almost all commercial production is of the double-flowered form, which is the one with white heads and few visible yellow discs.
Production
The double-flowered clone is grown for the trade because its heads are almost entirely ray florets, which dry to a clean white and look like the picture on a packet. Flowers are picked at full bloom and dried in shade at low temperature. Material dried hot browns and loses the apple note first and the bitterness last, which is the wrong way round.
Preparation
Infusion
Herbal infusion (tisane)
1–2 g/100 ml · 90–95 °C · 4 min
Category-typical practice rather than a measurement for this specific botanical. Most infusions are far more tolerant of a long steep than tea is.
What gets confused
One English word covers two genera. TeaHQ itself carried “Roman chamomile” as an alias of Matricaria chamomilla until a taxonomic retrieval showed the name is not among that species’ common names at all. Packets rarely say which plant is inside, and the two are priced and traded separately by anyone who cares. Anthemis nobilis on a label is this plant under an older name, not a third thing.
Common mistakes
- Steeping it as long as German chamomile. The bitterness arrives sooner and stays.
- Buying by the photograph. Both plants photograph as a white daisy with a yellow centre.
Evidence for this page
This page is TeaHQ synthesis throughout. No external source stands behind any statement on it, including the botanical name. 132 of the 204 botanicals have had their names and distribution checked against a taxonomic authority and this is not one of them.
Brewing parameters here are typical practice for the category rather than measurements of this plant, and each set says so.
This page makes no safety claim. It describes what Roman chamomile is, where it comes from and how it is prepared — not what it does to a person. The absence of a safety note here is not a statement that the plant is safe. How TeaHQ handles this.